Using Thoughtful Digital Engagement to Drive Stewardship

National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) is the nation’s largest grassroots mental health organization, supporting millions of Americans affected by mental illness. For nearly 50 years, the organization has maintained a nationwide helpline and referral network, connecting people living with mental illness, their family members and caregivers, mental health providers, and the public with local resources along with NAMI programs. 

Through an alliance of more than 600 local affiliates and 49 state organizations, NAMI works within communities to increase mental health awareness and education. NAMI advocates for federal and state resources and programs to support stronger mental health communities.  

NAMI envisions a world where all people affected by mental illness live healthy, fulfilling lives supported by a community that cares. 

The Situation

NAMI partnered with AGP to explore new strategies for acquiring donors, sparking donations, and enhancing donor loyalty and connection. As our team examined NAMI’s outreach efforts, we observed that the direct response fundraising program lacked elements of stewardship and engagement. 

This gave us an opportunity to create digital engagement campaigns that would fit into the organization’s greater effort to infuse stewardship through direct mail, digital, and phone.  

The top goal of the new digital engagement campaign was to engage donors and constituents with meaningful touchpoints for NAMI that weren’t fundraising-focused. We also aimed to foster a sense of community across all donor groups and share a message of thanks for their support. 

The Work

Digital campaigns can be more engaging and cost-effective to implement than multiple mailings. As a result, we were able to develop several campaigns around different themes. We then encouraged participants to share the themes’ central message on their own social channels by using a hashtag designated for each campaign. 

The digital campaigns included: 

• Mental Health Awareness Month (MHAM): NAMI typically runs an extensive fundraising campaign in May. To kick things off, we launched an engagement campaign for the first two weeks of the month, asking constituents to submit a digital note explaining why mental health matters to them. The notes were collected and displayed on a message wall for others to visit and read. 

• Summer Selfie: Building on MHAM momentum, we then implemented a similar campaign during the summer months. This engagement campaign took a more light-hearted approach, asking people to submit selfies showing how they de-stress during the summer. The campaign gave constituents an opportunity to share and reflect on positive summertime self-care activities.  

• Thanksgiving Gratitude: For Thanksgiving, we ran a final engagement campaign asking people to share what they’re thankful for this year. The messages were then posted to a digital wall to be shared with others.  

Our team developed the strategy, user experience, and journey mapping behind each campaign. We also provided copywriting and design for all assets, including emails, social media posts, and message boards.  

It was also critical to our organization and to NAMI that the messages submitted by constituents be reviewed before being posted publicly, so we implemented a careful review process for that as well. 

The Results

NAMI’s digital campaigns saw more click rates than its fundraising emails, and the conversion rate was stronger, too. Engagement grew with each campaign. 

• Mental Health Awareness Month: 690 messages submitted 

• Summer Selfie: 850 photos submitted 

• Thanksgiving Gratitude: 1,000 messages submitted 

Those who interacted with the campaigns came away with a stronger sense of community and a more meaningful connection with NAMI. Next, the team plans to conduct a long-term analysis to determine which types of downstream donations result from the engagement.  

Creative